Extreme Networks, Inc. (Extreme) is a provider of cloud networking solutions and industry leading services and support.
Extreme designs, develops, and manufactures wired, wireless, and software-defined wide area-network (‘SD- WAN’) infrastructure equipment, software and cloud-based network management solutions. The company's cloud solution is a single platform that offers unified network management of wireless access points, switches, and SD-WAN. It leverages machine learning, Artificial Intell...
Extreme Networks, Inc. (Extreme) is a provider of cloud networking solutions and industry leading services and support.
Extreme designs, develops, and manufactures wired, wireless, and software-defined wide area-network (‘SD- WAN’) infrastructure equipment, software and cloud-based network management solutions. The company's cloud solution is a single platform that offers unified network management of wireless access points, switches, and SD-WAN. It leverages machine learning, Artificial Intelligence for Information Technology Operations (‘AIOps’) and analytics to help customers deliver secure connectivity at the edge of the network, speed cloud deployments, and uncover actionable insights to save time, lower costs, and streamline operations.
Extreme’s cloud networking technologies provide flexibility and scalability in deployment, management, and licensing of networks globally. The company’s global footprint provides service to over 50,000 customers including some of the world’s leading names in business, hospitality, retail, transportation and logistics, education, government, healthcare, manufacturing, and service providers. The company derives all its revenues from the sale of the company’s networking equipment, software subscriptions, and related maintenance contracts.
The Extreme Strategy
The company is driven to help its customers find new ways to deliver better outcomes. Connectivity is just the foundation. The company makes the network a strategic asset. The combination of the company’s solutions provides the connectivity, bandwidth, performance and insights that organizations of all sizes need to move their organizations forward. IT leaders are now tasked with ensuring the global, hybrid workforce is functional and successful no matter where they are, and ensuring people can work wherever they want.
The integration of AI, security and analytics into a single platform is a key differentiator for Extreme, as it allows the company to bring greater simplicity and flexibility for customers. Modern networking approaches enhance security and flexibility for enterprises and there is a rise in cloud-based services, SD-WAN and other driving forces to deliver services to customers and employees while minimizing cyber security threats. Extreme is investing in products that help customers drive flexibility and resilience in infrastructure.
Customers recognize that Extreme offers the simplest and easiest to manage, end-to-end enterprise networking platform in the industry. The company’s One Network, One Cloud, One Extreme solution, enhanced with the company’s AI Ops capabilities, excels relative to the complex and high total cost of ownership solutions of the company’s competitors. This framework remains a competitive differentiator, particularly at a time when major competitors have created complexity with disjointed solutions and uncertainty in their long-term rationalization of products and solutions. The company is focused on helping customers find new ways to deliver better outcomes, such as increased IT productivity, reduced operating expenses, or securing their business. The company’s sole focus on networking allows the company to offer a differentiated and integrated portfolio and a clear roadmap to meet customers’ needs.
Cloud networking management allows customers to gain real-time visibility and insights into areas such as application usage, location and workflow patterns across their environment, helping to inform strategic business decisions and create personalized experiences. Customers benefit from visibility, control and reduced time to resolution. This is the cornerstone of the company’s One Network, One Cloud, One Extreme vision. Subscription services allow the company to deliver more value over time to this installed base. The company’s flexibility in delivering management, AI, security and other capabilities to customers both on premises and in the cloud gives them much more value than the company’s competitors. The company has one license per device and compared to the complicated offerings of the company’s competitors, this is a very differentiated value proposition. Extreme’s broad product, solutions, and technology portfolio supports these tenets and continues to innovate and evolve them to help businesses succeed.
Extreme has recognized that the way the company and its customers communicate has changed and given rise to these distributed enterprise environments, or in other words, the Infinite Enterprise, which has three tenets:
Infinitely distributed connectivity is the enterprise-grade reliable connectivity that allows users to connect anywhere, from anywhere. It is always present, available and assured, while being secure and manageable.
Scalable cloud allows administrators to harness the power of the cloud to efficiently onboard, manage, orchestrate, troubleshoot the network, and find data and insights of the distributed connectivity at their pace in their way.
Consumer-centric experience designed to deliver a best-in-class experience to users who consume network services.
Extreme’s broad product, solutions and technology portfolio supports these three tenets and continues to innovate and evolve them to help businesses succeed.
Key elements of Extreme’s strategy and differentiation include creating effortless networking solutions that allow all of the company to advance; providing a differentiated end-to-end cloud architecture; offering customers choice: public or private cloud, or on-premises; highest value of cloud management subscriptions; additional AI capabilities; offering universal platforms for enterprise class switching and wireless infrastructure; utilizing AI to improve mean time to resolution for customers, both through the company’s AIOps offerings as well as internal use of Extreme AI Expert; enabling a common fabric to simplify and automate the network; offering a frictionless experience for secure hybrid work; end-to-end portfolio; providing high-quality in-house customer service and support; extending switching and routing technology leadership; expanding Wi-Fi technology leadership; offering a superior quality of experience; expanding market penetration by targeting high-growth market segments; leveraging and expanding multiple distribution channels; and maintaining and extending the company’s strategic relationships.
Products
The company’s products and services categories include:
Cloud Networking Platform: Core to the company’s product portfolio and providing the end-to-end visibility and control from the access edge to the data center is the company’s industry-leading cloud platform and cloud management application, ExtremeCloud IQ. ExtremeCloud IQ is an ML/AI powered, wired and wireless cloud network management solution that offers advanced visibility and control over users, devices, and applications. ExtremeCloud IQ is designed to allow customers to keep operational costs low, adjusts to customer demand, and delivers robust functionality for provisioning, management, troubleshooting and guaranteed data durability to assure access with 100% uptime. ExtremeCloud IQ is available in three deployment options (public, private, on-premises) that support one goal – to provide customers with maximum flexibility, continuous innovation and consistent user experience. It can be deployed in any major data center environment such as AWS, GCP and Azure, or local private cloud options. The ExtremeCloud IQ application already manages around three million devices in public, private, and on-premises global cloud deployment. The platform is run from multiple regional data centers, giving customers greater control over the location of their data and adding to the resiliency of the platform.
Automation, Analytics, and Security Applications: The company’s application portfolio delivers additional analytics, security, access control, and management insights both on-premises and in the cloud. ExtremeCloud IQ – Site Engine extends cloud management to non-cloud native and multi-vendor devices to provide one dashboard view of your entire network that can be managed in the cloud or on-premises. The application provides task automation, access control, granular visibility with real-time analytics and multi-vendor device management. ExtremeCloud IQ Essentials provides three key applications - WIPS, location services, and guest management - for ExtremeCloud IQ Pilot license customers at no added cost, enabling organizations to take advantage of an all-in-one platform for wired and wireless management, business insights, location tracking, wireless security, seamless IoT onboarding and guest access, and guest access through a single user interface.
Wireless LAN AP: One of the industry’s broadest and most comprehensive, Extreme’s wireless AP portfolio includes both indoor and outdoor Wi-Fi 7 and prior generation APs. Proven in some of the most demanding environments, ExtremeWireless delivers an exceptional experience for BYOD and mobile users wherever they may roam. Included in that portfolio are the company’s custom stadium and large venue outdoor Wi-Fi 7 APs, which, when combined with ExtremeAnalytics, are the basis of the company’s selection as the Official Wi-Fi & Analytics Provider for the National Football League and Major League Baseball. In addition to powering large venues and stadiums, the company’s Extreme APs also deliver flexible and scalable options for highly distributed environments for major companies globally. The company’s APs allow its customers to purchase unified hardware, starting with the company’s Wi-Fi 7 AP portfolio, and choose the software mode option for the optimal deployment architecture in their environments. The company’s premier wireless security solution, Extreme AirDefense delivers intrusion detection and prevention capabilities across the wireless portfolio. Recently, the company also introduced the first WIPS solution to incorporate support for Bluetooth and Bluetooth Low Energy (‘BLE’) visibility and intrusion protection. This includes device location support and change detection, rogue BLE Beacon detection and unsanctioned BLE device detection.
Wired for Edge, Campus, and Data Center: The company’s switching portfolio includes products designed to make every connection effortless by enabling the deployment of high-speed performance at scale for access, high-density, campus, core, and data center environments. Within the ExtremeSwitching portfolio are Access Edge products offering connection speeds ranging from 100 Megabytes per second (‘Mbps’) to 25 Gigabytes per second (‘Gbps’) – including edge multi-rate 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps capabilities. These switches provide various physical presentations (copper and fiber) along with options to deliver traditional Ethernet or convergence-friendly Power-over-Ethernet (‘PoE’), including high-power universal POE consisting of 90W power to support new classes of Ethernet-powered devices. These switching products, combined with the company’s unique fabric capability, deliver automation and hyper-segmentation, as well as features, performance, and reliability required by the company’s customers to deploy, operate and manage converged infrastructure, along with the ability to harden the perimeter of the network infrastructure.
The company’s aggregation/core switches are designed to address the demanding needs of aggregation, top-of-rack, and campus core environments. Delivering 10G, 25G, 40G, 50G, and 100G connectivity with maximum throughput and reliability, these switches provide flexible Ethernet connectivity over a range of interface types and speeds and are available in both fixed and modular configurations. These switching platforms, in conjunction with the company’s advanced operating systems and centralized management software, provide the density, performance, and reliability required to serve in a diverse range of environments, especially where application demands and uptime expectations are mission critical.
The company’s campus switch portfolio also includes next-generation, low-profile, high-density Ethernet switches that empower the creation of versatile always-on campus solutions that are fabric-enabled and 25 to 100 gigabit-ready. The technologies supported by these innovative platforms can also leverage automated network attachment to proactively reduce operational burden and time-to-service.
Extreme’s data center switches and routers provide high levels of reliability and throughput - specifically designed to address the exacting demands of high-performance enterprise and cloud data centers. These products are available in both fixed and modular chassis configurations and include a set of advanced features, such as redundant management and fabric modules, hot-swappable line cards on the company’s chassis-based platforms, as well as multi-speed stacking of up to 100G and flexible 10/25/40/50/100G port options on the company’s fixed-form platforms, which makes these switches well-suited for enterprise data center environments. Both platform types also provide redundant power supplies and fan trays to ensure high hardware availability.
These switches also provide key feature extensions for data centers through technologies that include Virtual Extensible LAN, MPLS/VPLS, and Shortest Path Bridging capabilities. The company’s industry-first integrated Extreme Fabric Automation simplifies and adds scalability to even the highest performance environments. In addition to these capabilities, the company’s data center switches offer innovative traffic optimization enabling virtual machine mobility via Layer 3 Data Center Interconnect. The company’s architecture delivers tens of millions of flows for deep visibility and control over users, services, and applications to meet the analytic and policy demands of today’s business applications.
SD-WAN: ExtremeCloud SD-WAN is a software-defined wide area networks solution offered as an all-inclusive subscription, which includes hardware, the cloud-based SD-WAN service, support and maintenance, and customer success support. This helps customers reduce total cost of ownership as they deliver quality user experience for applications used in site-to-site and site-to-cloud environments. This solution detects and optimizes applications automatically and can apply performance-based dynamic WAN selection for quality and reliability. Included also are security options such as a built-in zone-based firewall, EdgeSentry (in partnership with Check Point) for cloud-based firewall as a service and other advanced security capabilities, and integration with Secure Web Gateway partners such as Palo Alto Networks, Zscaler, and Symantec.
Cloud Native Platforms and Applications for Service Providers: 5G is the first generation of cellular technologies built on cloud-native principles, and most traditional network visibility tools cannot be easily adapted for future use cases like autonomous vehicles or industrial IoT. Because many 5G use cases are still undefined, service providers need a composable solution that provides visibility into highly distributed environments and is flexible enough to be adjusted for specific purposes as they arise, without requiring expensive, time-consuming infrastructure upgrades. Extreme has introduced the 9000 series switches and related software, featuring the Extreme 9920 intelligent network visibility platform built with cloud-native design principles and a composable data pipeline to provide highly scalable traffic aggregation, packet filtering, replication, and advanced network packet processing for analytics tools in distributed network environments. The Extreme Visibility Manager has an intuitive graphical user interface to establish new rule sets and commands for all of Extreme's visibility devices. It provides full visibility into every aspect of the network, from a highly geographically dispersed environment with regions and zones to the services running on the system.
Universal ZTNA. ExtremeCloud Universal ZTNA is designed to be the easiest, most complete network access security solution for users everywhere. It is intended to deliver a frictionless user experience and consistent security policy for applications and devices, including IoT. The company offers one secure access solution that uses a single identity-based zero trust policy engine for both networks and applications. As a result, customers could have just one solution to secure employees, guests and IoT devices. The company offers automated security configuration and enforcement via cloud-managed Universal Devices and unified visualization and reporting for enhanced insight and simplified management.
Customer Service and Support: The company’s customers seek high reliability and maximum uptime for their networks. To that extent, the company provides the following service offerings:
Support services for end-users, resellers and distributors. The company meet the service requirements of its customers and channel partners through the company’s Technical Assistance Centers (‘TACs’), located in Morrisville, North Carolina; Salem, New Hampshire; Aurora, Illinois; San Jose, California; Reading, United Kingdom; Penang, Malaysia; Brno, Czech Republic; Bangalore; Chennai, India; Seoul, Korea and Tokyo, Japan. The company’s TAC engineers and technicians assist in diagnosing and troubleshooting technical issues regarding customer networks. Development engineers work with the TACs to resolve product functionality issues specific to each customer.
Premier services. Premier Support is a proactive, high touch post-sale support service that assists customers in managing their Extreme Networks products and network. All resources and deliverables are designed to manage day-to-day technical needs, provide analysis and recommendations while building strong customer relationships, all focused on the network level.
Professional services. The company provides consultative services to improve customer productivity in all phases of the network lifecycle – planning, design, implementation, operations and optimization management. The company’s network architects develop and execute customized software and service-led networking solutions for deployment plans to meet individualized network strategies. These activities may include the management and coordination of the design and network configuration, resource planning, staging, logistics, migration and deployment. The company also provides customized training and operational best practices manuals to assist customers in the transition and sustenance of their networks.
Education. The company offers classes covering a wide range of topics such as installation, configuration, operation, management and optimization – providing customers with the necessary knowledge and experience to successfully deploy and manage the company’s products in various networking environments. Classes may be scheduled and available at numerous locations worldwide. The company delivers training using its staff, on-line training classes and authorized training partners. In addition, the company makes much of its training materials accessible free-of-charge on the company’s internet site for customers and partners to use in self-education. This approach enhances the market’s ability to learn and understand the broad array of advantages of the company’s products.
Sales, Marketing and Distribution
The company conducts its sales and marketing activities on a worldwide basis through a channel that utilizes distributors, resellers and the company’s field sales organization. As of June 30, 2024, the company’s worldwide sales and marketing organization consisted of 872 employees. The company has domestic sales offices located in four states within the United States and international sales offices located in 28 countries.
The company sells its products primarily through an ecosystem of channel partners who combine the company’s infinite enterprise vision and product portfolio consisting of cloud-driven applications, wired, wireless, management and analytics software products with their vertical specific offerings to create compelling information technology solutions for end-user customers. The company utilizes its field sales organization to support the company’s channel partners and to sell directly to certain end-user customers, including some large enterprise and service provider global accounts.
The details of the company’s sales and distribution channels are as follows:
Original Equipment Manufacturers (‘OEM’) and Strategic Relationships. The company has active alliance, OEM and strategic relationships with Barco NV, Ericsson Enterprise AB, Lenovo, Motorola Solutions, Schneider Electric, and Verizon, as well as other global industry technology leaders in which the company’s products are qualified to be included into an overall solution or reference architecture. These tested and validated solutions are then marketed and sold by the alliance, OEM or strategic partners into their specific verticals, market segments and customers as turnkey offerings.
Distributors. The company has established several key relationships with leading distributors in the electronics and computer networking industries. Each of the company’s distributors primarily resells the company’s products to resellers. The distributors enhance the company’s ability to sell and provide support to resellers who may benefit from the broad service and product fulfillment capabilities offered by these distributors. Extreme maintains distribution agreements with the company’s largest distributors, Westcon Group Inc., TD Synnex Corporation and Jenne Inc. on substantially the same material terms as the company generally enters into with each of its distribution partners.
Resellers. The company relies on many resellers worldwide that sell directly to the end-user customer. The company’s resellers include regional networking system resellers, resellers who focus on specific vertical markets, value added resellers, network integrators and wholesale resellers. The company provides training and support to its resellers and the company’s resellers generally provide the first level of contact to end-users of the company’s products. The company’s relationships with resellers are on a non-exclusive basis.
Field Sales. The company’s field sales organization is trained to sell solutions, support and develop leads for the company’s resellers and to establish and maintain key accounts and strategic end-user customers. To support these objectives, the company’s field sales force:
Assists end-user customers in finding solutions to complex network system and architecture problems;
Differentiates the features and capabilities of the company’s products from competitive offerings;
Continually monitors and understands the evolving networking needs of enterprise and service provider customers;
Promotes the company’s products and ensures direct contact with current and potential customers; and
Assists the company’s resellers to drive business opportunities to closure.
The company has focused on the specific verticals of healthcare, education, retail, manufacturing, government, sports, and entertainment venues.
International sales
International sales are an important portion of the company’s business. In fiscal 2024, sales to customers outside of the United States accounted for 48% of the company’s consolidated net revenues. These sales are conducted primarily through foreign-based distributors and resellers managed by the company’s worldwide sales organization. In addition, the company has direct sales to end-user customers, including large global accounts. The primary markets for sales outside of the United States are countries in Europe and Asia, as well as Canada, Mexico, Central America and South America.
The company operates in one segment, the development and marketing of network infrastructure equipment and related software.
Marketing
The company continues to develop and execute a number of marketing programs to support the sale and distribution of the company’s products by communicating the value of the company’s solutions to its existing and potential customers, the company’s distribution channels, its resellers and the company’s technology alliance partners. The company’s marketing efforts include participation in industry tradeshows, conferences and seminars, publication of technical and educational articles in industry journals, communication across social media channels, frequent updates to the company’s publicly available website, promotions, web-based training courses, advertising, analyst relations and public relations. The company also submits its products for independent product testing and evaluation. Extreme participates in numerous industry analyst recognitions and placements including Gartner Magic Quadrants, Gartner Critical Capabilities, Gartner Peer Insights, Gartner Customer Choice, Forrester Waves and IDC MarketScapes.
Seasonality
Like many of the company’s competitors, the company historically has experienced seasonal fluctuations in customer spending patterns, which generally adversely affect the company’s first and third fiscal quarters (year ended June 2024). This pattern should not be relied upon or be considered indicative of the company’s future performance, as it has varied in the past.
Manufacturing
The company relies upon original design manufacturers (‘ODM’), such as Alpha Networks, Inc., Lite-On Technology Corporation, Quanta Computer Inc., Senao Networks, Inc., Sercomm Corporation, and Wistron Neweb Corporation to manufacture, support and ship the company’s products, and therefore are exposed to risks associated with their businesses, financial condition, and geopolitical conflict in geographies in which they operate.
Intellectual Property
As of June 30, 2024, the company had 681 issued patents in the United States and 451 patents outside of the United States. The expiration dates of the company’s issued patents in the United States range from calendar years 2024 to 2041. As of June 30, 2024, the company had 31 registered trademarks in the United States and 341 registered trademarks outside of the United States.
In addition, the company provides its software products to end-user customers primarily under ‘clickwrap’ license agreements.
Competition
To a lesser extent, Extreme competes with products and solutions from Arista Networks Inc., CommScope Holding Company, Inc., Fortinet, Inc., and Ubiquiti Inc.
Environmental Matters
The company is subject to regulatory developments, including SEC disclosure regulations relating to so-called ‘conflict minerals,’ relating to ethically responsible sourcing of the components and materials used in the company’s products.
The company maintains compliance with various regulations related to the environment, including the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment and the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment regulations adopted by the European Union.
History
Extreme Networks, Inc. was founded in 1996. The company was incorporated in California in 1996 and reincorporated in Delaware in 1999.
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